Author Notes:

This story is complete and the rest will be posted over the next upcoming week.

Warnings for: language, violence, descriptions of violence

Author's notes: This story takes place in an ambiguous timeline set after The Defenders and The Punisher. No actual spoilers for The Punisher and a small one for The Defenders. This can be read without having seen the shows.

I spent the last couple of months writing this. Sometimes you must follow the muse into the self indulgence.

Thank you to Gaelicspirit for being there every step of the way with your suggestions and to Esteefee for the final look and ideas. You guys rock.

It was humid and a light rain fell, water collecting in the folds of Frank's jacket. The dumpsters in the alley below overflowed with waste from the construction site. A charred electrical smell still lingered in the air from a recent demolition; two city blocks had been marked off for high-rise condos and overpriced shops.

Frank remembered eating pizza at the corner as boy, but now….

He looked through his riflescope, peering down at his targets from on top a warehouse six stories high. Gangs started using this spot for meetings since it was well hidden from the rest of the city. He'd only waited two hours before five guys showed up; they were close enough he didn't need night vision. He rested the barrel of his Vanquish along the wall, one hand around the trigger guard, the other adjusting the direction of his microphone boom.

Intel on the weapon's ring he was tracking was scarce, forcing him to conduct surveillance on those bragging about a recent purchase.

"How much for the iron?"

"Two Gs."

"Damn, man."

"We need ten more.

Frank checked the sight again; they had Heckler & Koch MP5A3s. He curled his finger around the trigger.

"We need to hit back at Bone, man."

His left eyebrow twitched. Funny, Bone and his buddies planned on striking these piss-ants tonight. Speaking of….

An old model Honda parked outside the alley, four members of a rival gang exiting, each with more artillery.

Some piece of shit was arming thugs with hundreds of assault rifles, including suppressed variants. He didn't care if they killed each other, but the collateral damage from their war was soaring. One of the latest victims of a drive-by had been the homeless vet who recycled cans on Frank's block.

He was going to put a bullet in the asshole arming both sides of a street war.

Frank swung his scope around, trained it on the backs of the four new targets, wiping away some of the rain running down his face. It would only take ten seconds to pick them all off.

Someone coughed.

"What the hell was that?" one of them shouted.

A few seconds later, the shooting started.

Hundreds of rounds were expelled in ninety seconds, yet almost everyone was left still standing. Amateurs. This wasn't a damn video game; it took more effort than pointing and squeezing a trigger. But a bullet could strike a person nine hundred yards away and the odds of one killing a civilian were greater than Frank preferred.

He only needed one person alive to question. Frank adjusted the mil-radius of his scope and aimed at the furthest target.

Crack.

One…two…three went down.

The others scattered, a few of them firing randomly in the air. Frank moved positions and took aim—dropping several more until there was no one left to shoot.

He studied the scene through his scope; there were maybe six bodies. He needed visual confirmation. The others were either injured or escaped. He started packing up his rifle when he heard a ragged scream – it must have lasted twenty seconds.

Frank had heard plenty of people cry out in agony, this sounded worse. By the time it ended, he heard a second one. Shouldering his rifle, he made his way toward the stairwell door exit to investigate.

There were seven bodies, five from his Vanquish, two from a MP5. Three MIA. Frank's field of vision had been clear despite the drizzle, so the others had evacced into the sprawling industrial site. It could take hours to find anyone given the number of buildings.

His muscles tensed; it felt like he was in the crosshairs of a rifle. Frank turned around, sweeping his gaze in all directions, but he didn't see anyone. His gut told him to keep moving.

His boots crunched over loose rock as he entered the back of the construction zone. Bulldozers lined outside one side of a building that would be smashed to pieces once it stopped raining. He pulled out the M16 tethered to his gun belt, holding it at ready position.

A heavy scent of minerals hit his nostrils; he knew that odor.

Shoulders bunched, his eyes scanned the darkness while he listened for signs of movement. After several steps, Frank stopped and looked down at a large volume of blood splatter. It was everywhere.

As he knelt down, Frank noticed a set of drag marks leading further into the depilated building. Keeping his weapon trained in front of him, Frank entered the demolition area and followed the blood trail until he found the source.

Two bodies had been flayed open and their heads removed. It was a surreal display of violence. He wasn't shocked by much anymore; what bothered him was the fact this butchering took place in minutes. Without signs of struggle.

He swallowed against an onslaught of memories he'd forced out of his head: the man he used to be, images of jungles, flashes of carnage. Decapitations. Gritting his teeth, he shoved it all into the black pit inside him.

Spinning around, Frank started walking away, but he couldn't suppress that damn voice in his head that told him he was retreating. Turning his back on a promise he'd once made to the fallen.

He stood, debating with himself when he noticed something not quite right in the dirt. A piece of metal stuck out from the ground from where it was partially buried. Studying the area for risk, he knelt beside the thing and started digging.

Matt knew more about guns than he wanted to. Every weapon had a unique sound; it came down to design. The same cartridge in one rifle might not produce the same sounds in another because the gas port could be in a different place, the barrel a different length. AK-47s sounded like a lot of other stamped-steel guns, but the way the gas escaped the barrel, the distinctive sound it made as the bullet went hypersonic, was totally unique from other assault rifles.

For the last three days the sound of gunfire haunted Matt; shoot-outs during the afternoon, all out battles in the streets at night. The body count had been staggering with no signs of ending.

Matt had stopped several confrontations, saved a family from the crossfire of one intense battle, and put six members of two gangs in the hospital. But this was a bloody war with both sides armed with heavy firepower and no regard for life.

He stood on the roof of his building, deciding which block to investigate in hopes of figuring out the source of the sudden violence between the gangs so he could stop it. The warm drizzle became a heavy rain as atmospheric pressure changed. Maybe the bad weather would prevent another night of bloodshed.

A volley of gunfire erupted a few blocks away involving at least five people, AK-47s and M6s. Matt released a heavy exhale. Or maybe not.

Knowing how gunfire echoed between buildings, Matt listened for the sound of empty cartridges hitting cement and the smell of smoke from the chambers. Then he chased after the newest round of violence tearing apart his city.

The dry-cleaners and sub shop were shot to pieces, and hundreds of bullet casings littered the street, some of them washing away into the gutters from the pounding rain. But there wasn't anyone around for Matt to track down, no elevated heartbeats or body heat. At least this wasn't a residential block.

He listened for signs of gunshots, wondering what would cause everyone to scatter only a few minutes after a battle began. His feet splashing in the growing puddles, Matt was drawn by a fresh scent of blood, diluted by the rainwater but stemming from the alley.

The trail of blood grew larger; the sheer volume meant that whoever lost it could no longer be alive. The smell was awful, like someone had rubbed pennies inside Matt's nose.

Then the odor became acidic, his chest tightening in recognition of intestines and stomach contents. God, what happened?

His own guts twisted at the sheer stench and horror of it all when he heard a cry of pure terror in the distance.

Pulse pounding, Matt ran toward the location of the screaming.

Matt raced over rooftops, keeping to the outer ledges so he could stop and listen. Rain beat down on his helmet, over concrete, buildings, generators, street noise generating bombarding sound waves.

He searched for higher pitch sounds; the human scream could reach over 30HZ, and the wind and rain could impact that, bending all ambient sounds downward.

A guttural yell bounced between buildings.

Breathing hard, Matt followed the sound all the way toward the garment district. Using his baton, he looped the steel cable over a power line and slid down from the eight-story apartment building to the ground. With a flick of his wrist, the cable retracted as his feet pounded down the alley.

He could smell fear: tears and sweat, and the increased adrenaline in the body odor of the guy trying to hide under a dumpster. Matt slowed his pace, searching for threats, but the only heat signature was from the person trying to cram himself beneath the metal container.

Walking down the alleyway, he stopped a few feet from the person. "Sir, what's the matter?"

But the man was too busy crying to hear him. His bone density and light heart rhythm indicated he was young, maybe sixteen or seventeen. The detergent from his clothes and fresh soap indicated he wasn't homeless. The teen's skin didn't secrete signs of drugs, but his heart rate was dangerously fast.

Matt noticed the M6 clutched between his hands. The cartridge was empty. He lowered to a crouch. "Were you part of the shootout from a few minutes ago?"

Based on the thump, the teen bumped his head on the dumpster, his breath hitching even faster. "What? No…get the hell away from me!" His pulse raced. "You're…you're him! El Diablo!"

"I'm not going to hurt you." Matt kept his distance, still keeping at eye-level. "I'm not going to get closer, I promise," he said, keeping his tone even. "What's your name?"

"Nah, y-you…you...can't help me. That…that demon….I've...I've seen him."

The kid was petrified, his breathing harsh and fast. "You're safe now," Matt told him. "Come on, how about crawling out of there?"

The teen picked himself off the ground and stood up, grabbing his weapon, but he didn't point it at Matt.

"What's your name?" Matt asked.

"Cu…Cuchillo."

"Knife?"

"Yeah, man. What's it to ya?"

"Nothing. It's fine." Matt wondered if he could get Cuchillo to go to the hospital. He was twitchy and sweating profusely. "Do you want me to take you somewhere?"

"There's nowhere I can go….that thing…." Cuchillo started crying, his body trembling. "He killed Raul, man."

"Who killed your friend?"

"The demon! Ah, Dios, help me. He shoved a sword through his chest."

A sword? Matt grit his teeth. Were members of The Hand in the city again? Were they responsible for all this violence?

But his immediate attention was drawn to the traumatized young man in front of him. "I'm sorry, Cuchillo."

"What will I tell Raul's hermana?"

A siren wailed down the street, followed by an ambulance. A police car drove nearby, the radio scanner squawking with several dispatchers about an animal on the loose.

Gripping his rifle to his chest, Cuchillo panicked. "I gotta go."

A second car slowed to a stop, and Matt heard someone exit their vehicle and update the dispatcher with their location as they walked toward them.

Cuchillo bolted.

"Wait!" Matt called instinctively, but didn't give chase, knowing he needed to get some answers.

Instead, he climbed up the nearby fire escape to wait for the person walking over. He recognized the familiar heartbeat.

"Detective," Matt greeted.

Brett Mahoney swore under his breath. "I really don't have time for you tonight."

"Then I won't waste it."

"We're on a verge of a full-scale gang war. Thirty-five dead in the last month, ten in just the last two days. The police chief is going to announce curfews and, worst case scenario, we might call in the National Guard."

Brett's shoes scuffed against the ground as he paced.

"And tonight?" Matt pushed.

"What about it?" Brett growled.

"I thought you didn't have time to waste? I just ran into a kid who thinks there's a demon running around." Brett made a noise in his throat, but Matt ignored him. "And I think I found the remains of someone in the alley behind the coat factory."

"You discovered a body and didn't call it in?"

"No, I found what was left of a body." Matt swallowed, remembering the bile and blood on the ground. "It was…."

"The stuff that's supposed to be inside of one?"

"Yeah."

Brett started swearing, and Matt dropped down to the ground so he could stand next to him. "What's going on?"

"I don't know, wish to hell I did." Brett took a heavy breath. "We think there are some wild animals on the loose."

"What? Like a bunch of homicidal lions?"

"Look, we don't know. It's the only explanation for…." Brett shuddered inside his coat. "We found what looks like signs of several more DBs, minus the bodies. So, I don't have time for any more chit-chat."

"Detective–"

"You wanna help?" Brett challenged. "Find out who's arming a bunch of assholes with military hardware and call me. I'll bring the whole SWAT team with me."

"I'll call you."

"Yeah, I'll be waiting on the line holding my breath."

Brett stormed away, leaving Matt with little to go on. The rain started to let up, which meant it would be easier to track down whomever was out there killing people and stealing their bodies.

Jessica hated the rain; it screwed up her sinuses and throat. But Trish wanted her to meet up at this bar and it wasn't like Jessica would turn down a chance to drink. This week had sucked. Her client's husband was a dirt bag who embezzled from the family company, and some gang-war was making it hazardous to cross the street.

Trish better have taken a cab.

Speaking of taxis, where the hell were they? Jessica stopped for a moment and looked at the street signs. How the hell did she end up so far Southside? She needed to pay attention where her leads took her. Now she'd be late, not that Trish didn't hedge things by always giving Jess a time to meet and tacking on at least a half an hour extra.

Great, she was ten blocks away from the nearest intersection for cabs. The warehouse district sucked, but it provided embezzling husbands a place to set-up a cheap office for their off-the-books import-export business.

A cold sensation went down her back and Jessica froze, her eyes searching for the source of her apprehension. She listened for movement, trying to ignore a familiar sense of paranoia.

She heard a high-pitched scream and ran toward it.

Running behind the warehouse, she almost slipped on some trash. She searched for the source of the disturbance when all the hair on the back of the neck stood on end.

"Okay, asshole, show yourself," she shouted in the darkness.

"I think we're chasing the same thing," a voice came from her right.

Jessica spun around and found the Devil of Hell's Kitchen staring back at her. "What the hell?"

"I'm sorry," Matt said, holding up his hands. "I heard you and wanted you to know I was here."

"Have you've been following me?"

"No. I was coming from the other direction. I didn't know we were in the same area until a minute ago." He tilted his chin at her. "Why?"

"Nothing." Jessica did a double check of the alley again out of instinct. "Did you hear that scream?"

"Yeah. It came from behind that building." Matt gestured at a boarded-up warehouse with the side tagged by recent graffiti. "But there isn't anyone there now." He frowned, dropping his gaze at the ground his scowl deepening.

"What?" Because Jessica recognized that expression: it meant he'd zeroed-in on something.

His nostrils flared his Adam's apple bobbing up and down with a hard swallow. "Something…." Matt started walking.

"Hey, we've been through this withholding crap before." Jessica wasn't in the mood to deal with his half-truths.

He continued going around the corner of the warehouse, his steps slowing. "Oh, God…."

"What? Damn it, Murdock, start talking."

She darted to where he stood unmoving, but she couldn't make out much without light.

"I think…." His chest heaved, his voice shaky. "Jessica?"

Matt sounded scared, and that really grabbed her attention. "What do you see?"

"It doesn't make sense…it's…. I can see the fading heat of…." Matt paused. "There are three heads and there's blood all over the ground…but nothing else."

Jessica squinted that twisted sinking feeling in her stomach growing stronger as she walked toward whatever was freaking out Matt. He started following a few steps behind her.

"You said nothing else as in…." Jessica let the words die on her lips as she stared at three metal spikes, each with a human head shoved on top of it. "Fuck."

"Do you see anything…else?" Matt asked.

"Like the rest of a body?"

"Like any clue as to what caused this?"

Jessica was too busy trying not to gag. "Some sick sonofabitch—probably members of the MS-13's. They like making a statement."

Cocking his head again, Matt drew his lips together. "The police are nearby. There's been a lot of strange activity tonight."

"Ya think?" She pinched her nose closed against the stench.

"I found blood from a murder but not a body about an hour ago; the police think it might have been an animal attack."

"Yeah, well the animal was human." Jessica was sick of being reminded of the depravity of the universe. People were shit.

Matt stared in the direction of the spiked heads. "Can you take some pictures?"

Jessica pulled out her camera from her bag, swallowing down nausea. "We need to call the police."

"Yeah." He walked behind the spikes studying the ground.

She wondered how he perceived such a gruesome scene. What did it appear like to him? "It's hard to snap pics with you photo bombing all of them." But she'd grabbed enough.

Matt finished inspecting the scene before moving to stand next to her. "Do you think you could call this in anonymously and meet me at my place?"

"I don't want anything to do with this freak show."

"The key is above the doorframe if you beat me there."

"I know where you keep your key stashed, but I've got plans and I haven't agree to–"

Jessica turned around, but Matt had already disappeared, leaving her with something out of a horror movie. "God, you're such a dick," she muttered.

Jessica arrived at Matt's apartment, still reprimanding herself about getting dragged into whatever nightmare was taking place this time. Alien invasions, ninjas, and now medieval gore. New York was always trying to outdo itself.

She turned on the lights inside Matt's place and raided his refrigerator for beer. Gulping down half the bottle of Heineken, she stared at the way stuff inside his fridge was arranged by type, and at the Braille tags on Matt's various jars and containers.

"What the hell am I doing here?" And shit, she hadn't even texted Trish.

Putting the empty beer bottle inside the fridge, Jessica headed toward the door when she heard a sound from the roof. Too late.

Matt came down the loft stairs still dressed in his ridiculous outfit. But he didn't stop; he started pacing by his sofa, agitated.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"They found another body."

"And?"

Matt shook his head, his breathing sporadic, his voice tight. "It…."

He practically ripped away his helmet and tossed it on the table.

Jessica stepped closer to him. "Hey, take it easy."

She'd never seen him this way, even in the face of ninjas and hordes of armed bad guys, Matt never backed down, never showed signs of fear. Jessica rested her hands on top his shoulders. "Breathe. It's okay."

"The police…they found a body. Its…its spine was missing." He cleared his throat. "Who does that? Who mutilates a person?"

"Really horrible people," Jessica told him.

She could tell him a dozen different ways Killgrave had brutalized his victims, but that wouldn't offer much comfort. Instead she touched the side of his jaw, one of the few spots that wasn't covered by body armor. "This is where I'm supposed to tell you that everything's going to be okay, but we both know I don't do that, and the world really kind of sucks."

He laughed, some of the tension bleeding out of shoulders. "Yeah, well, it's up to us to try to make it better."

She snorted, dropping her hands to her sides. "Ever the optimist."

But the exchange seemed to have a grounding effect, and Matt gave her a wan smile before going to his kitchen sink to grab an empty glass. "What do you know about this recent gang war?"

Jessica rolled her eyes. "Just what's on the news. Some dispute between the Mac Ballers and MS-13's. Bunch of violent, hot-headed assholes who think high body counts mean good business."

"The Mac Ballers, they're a set of the Bloods gang, right?"

"Yeah, part of the crime-happy hoods that began at Riker's Island. They own most of the New York drug trade now."

"MS-13 originated from L.A…. Mostly sex-trafficking and drugs."

"They took their name from the Salvadoran peasants during a civil war. But they mainly control Brooklyn and Queens."

"Maybe that's the dispute, they're trying to move into Mac Baller territory." Matt pursed his lips in humor. "You seem to know a lot about gang activity."

"It's my job to know about all the crap going on in the streets. But to be honest, the person we should call is Luke. He'd know more about any possible turf disputes."

But Matt had stopped paying attention. She was about to ask him what was going on when his head snapped in direction of the stairs. Pulling out his baton, he waited at the bottom of the stairwell, his gloved hand tightening around his weapon.

"What is it?" Jessica asked, moving closer to him.

After a moment, Matt lowered his baton and released an annoyed sigh. "What the hell are you doing here?"

A broad-shouldered guy in a black coat came down the stairs from Matt's roof with a duffel bag slung over his shoulder. "I don't think this is about a turf dispute."

Jessica stared as the guy descended the stairs and walked past Matt into his living room.

"Who the hell are you?" she demanded.

"Frank."

Then she recognized his face from the newspapers. "As in Frank Castle?"

Castle ignored her and nodded to Matt. "We need to talk."

Jessica whipped her head around at Matt, noting how Mr. Secret Identity hadn't wigged out that The Punisher was inside his apartment. "You really don't have good judgment about the company you keep."

"Does that include everyone in the room?" Castle asked.

"Last I checked I wasn't a card carrying sociopath."

Matt slid between them and looked in Castle's direction. "Whatever you want you can say in front of Jessica. Right now."

"I'm not a part of your vigilant club," Jessica growled.

"I think lot of people are gonna die tonight," Castle said, glancing from Jessica to Matt. "Figured the only person who might be able help was you. I don't care who else tags along."

She was about to tell Castle where he could stick it when Matt interceded. "You have five minutes."

Jessica didn't know which of them she wanted to punch.

tbc...